Too Cool for School?

Back to School, a set on Flickr.

We've now nearing the end of our stay in Kathmandu and between all those Nepali festivals celebration and... going back to school we've been pretty busy!

As part of our intensive "how to become a good English teacher in 2 weeks" training, we got to spend 2 days in  a public school in Kathmandu. I was quite excited to go back to school, since I hadn't set foot in a classroom  for many years. Stepping into a playground crammed with kids ranging from 3 to 17 years old, wearing pretty blue uniforms and shouting "Namaste Miss" with big wide smiles, made me feel like skipping around... and also like hiding under the nearest bench at the idea that the following day, I would be the one standing in front of them, attempting to share my love for the English language.


The day at Gyanodaya Secondary School starts with the morning assembly in the courtyard before each of the approx 2,000 pupils make their way in a very orderly manner to their first class. On the menu this morning there is Nepali, English, Maths, Science and Social Studies but Jacinta, Hardy and I are each joining a different grade to observe their English lesson.


Our mission is to discreetly observe and take notes of what the teacher is doing well and what he could do differently, which will help us shape the next day's lesson plan. Well, observing without disturbing the class is in itself a challenge! I am sitting on a bench at the back of the class on the boys side and obviously my attempt to go unnoticed fails miserably, the kids are too excited to see a westerner in their class and keep asking me questions whilst I'm taking notes and trying to avoid eye contact with the teacher (as advised by our trainer) who is seemingly nervous about what I might say about her in my observations. After 40 minutes the bell rings and everyone runs out to their next lesson. I have a break before the next observation and I decide to explore the school a little bit more: the whole place is full of what looks like cool 1960's memorabilia, except here this is what they work with everyday. The school is one of the best in Kathmandu with an astounding pass-rate of nearly 100% for the leaving certificate (although how this is an effective measure of the quality of the teaching may be another debate) but it is poorly funded as most public schools. They're really trying to give kids the best chances to fit in a globalized environment though as they are introducing English as the teaching language for more and more subjects including maths and science, there's even signs in the school asking students to speak English within the premises of the school.


After our second observation we're off to prepare next day's lesson which we will deliver instead of the usual English teacher. I have the challenging task of preparing a reading-focused lesson on a text which is essentially a bad imitation of "Little Red Riding Hood". And the next day, here I am standing in front of 60 pupils. I never thought that teaching would be like a holiday but keeping 60 pupils interested in the topic, making sure they all take something away from the lesson whilst maintaining some illusion of order is NOT easy. All in all it goes pretty well except for the fact that I systematically forget to tell pupils to sit down once they've answered a question: once one of them stand up to answer, they won't sit down until you tell them. So halfway through the class I have a bunch of students standing and staring at me and I wonder what this is about until I realize I haven't authorized them to sit down again! Turns out I was not the only one making this mistake so I have a good laugh with Jacinta and Hardy about this later on.


I feel relieved and a bit sad leaving the school but knowing that those 2 days taught me more than any course could have and I can now bring some of this knowledge to the teachers in Humla.